Continue reading ‘Marisa Taylor on FBI Pre-Employment Polygraph Screening’ »]]> Marisa Taylor reports for McClatchy on the high failure rate of the FBI’s pre-employment polygraph screening program using, among other sources, a 198-page document containing complaints of discrimination associated with the Bureau’s polygraph program. Excerpt:

WASHINGTON — Thousands of job applicants come to FBI offices all across the country every year, eager to work for the top law enforcement agency in the U.S.

But many of them have their hopes dashed, and it’s not because of their work experience or education or criminal records. They’re turned down because they’ve failed their polygraph tests.

The FBI’s policy of barring job candidates who fail their polygraph tests clashes with the view of many scientists that government agencies shouldn’t be relying on polygraph testing to decide whether to hire or fire someone. Experts say polygraph testing isn’t a reliable indicator of whether someone is lying – especially in employment screening.

Further, a little-known technical glitch in one of the leading polygraphs that the bureau and many other government agencies have used could give applicants who fail polygraphs even more reason to assert that they were inaccurately and unfairly labeled liars.

“I was called a lazy, lying, drug dealing junkie by a man who doesn’t know me , my stellar background or my societal contributions,” wrote one black applicant in Baltimore, who said he was told he qualified for a job except for his polygraph test failure. “Just because I am young and black does not automatically denote that I have ever used any illegal drugs.”

Government agencies use polygraph testing not only to weed out job applicants but also to question criminal suspects and to determine whether sex offenders are complying with psychological treatment or probation.

Although all polygraph testing is controversial, many scientists are highly critical of its use in job screening, saying it’s especially prone to inaccuracies because the questions are often more vague than they are in criminal investigations and therefore they’re more likely to provoke reactions from the innocent that might seem like deception.

Adding to the skepticism, polygraphers have documented problems with the measurement of sweat by the LX4000, a polygraph that the FBI and many other federal agencies and police departments across the country have used, McClatchy found. Polygraphers also interpret measurements of respiration and blood pressure for their decisions on whether someone is lying, but many see the sweat measurement as especially indicative of deception. The manufacturer of the LX4000, Lafayette Instrument Co. Inc., describes the problem as rare but it isn’t able to specify what that means. The company also points out that other polygraphs that use the same technology might have the problem as well.

Continue reading ‘The Inconvenient Issue of Alleged Anthrax Killer Bruce Ivins’ Polygraph Results’ »]]> On Tuesday, 15 February 2011, the National Research Council made public its Review of the Scientific Approaches Used During the FBI’s Investigation of the Anthrax Letters, seriously undermining the Bureau’s case against U.S. Army researcher Bruce Ivins, whom the FBI maintains was the sole perpetrator of the anthrax mailings.

Polygraphy was not among the scientific approaches reviewed by the National Research Council–appropriately so, as it has no scientific basis. Nonetheless, the FBI did rely extensively on polygraphy in its investigation of the anthrax mailings, and Ivins passed a 2002 polygraph examination regarding the anthrax attacks. The FBI avers that Ivins passed the polygraph by using countermeasures.

Jeff Stein of the Washington Post addresses Ivins’ polygraph results in a new SpyTalk column titled, “Ivins Case’s Inconvenient Issue: His Polygraph.”

For prior commentary on Ivins’ polygraph examination, see “DOJ Rationalizes Away Polygraph’s Failure to Catch Alleged Anthrax Killer Bruce Ivins” and Scott Horton’s interview of AntiPolygraph.org co-founder George Maschke. For insightful commentary on the latest (non-polygraph related) developments in the Ivins case, see Salon.com columnist Glenn Greenwald’s article, “Serious Doubts Cast on FBI’s Anthrax Case Against Bruce Ivins.”

Continue reading ‘John Dullahan, DIA Analyst Fired After Failing Polygraph, Profiled in Washington Post’ »]]> Washington Post staff writer Peter Finn reports in an above-the-fold front page article on the case of retired army lieutenant colonel and Defense Intelligence Agency analyst John Dullahan, whose security clearance was suspended in February 2009 after he failed three polygraph “tests.” Then DIA director LTG Michael D. Maples fired Dullahan in March 2009 (his last month as director).

DIA refuses to state its reasons for terminating LTC Dullahan, averring that “the interests of the nation do not permit disclosure to the employee of specific information about the reasons for his removal from federal service,” and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has not responded to an appeal Dullahan submitted some 18 months ago.

Dullahan is suing DIA in federal court challenging “the actions of the U.S. Government to arbitrarily and unceremoniously remove him from civilian employment and brand him a risk to the national security interests of the United States without explanation and devoid of due process of law.”

AntiPolygraph.org first reported on Dullahan’s case in January 2010. In his article published today, Finn reports new information on Dullahan’s polygraph experience:

In early 2008, with the permission of Dullahan’s DIA superiors, two FBI agents visited him at his office at Bolling Air Force Base in Washington and asked whether he would be willing to participate in a classified, black program. Dullahan, who cannot describe the FBI-DOD collaboration, readily accepted the offer.

But first he was asked to take a polygraph at an FBI facility in Baltimore.

“It was hooked up to everything,” recalled Dullahan, who said he had previously taken a couple of other polygraphs without incident. “Around my head, my chest, on each fingertip, underneath the seat, underneath my feet.”

AntiPolygraph.org is not aware of any polygraph instrumentation that would be placed around a subject’s head. However, sensors around the chest and attached to two fingertips are standard, and sensor pads in the seat of the polygraph chair and underneath the subject’s feet are intended to detect and/or deter the use of physical countermeasures.

An hour or so into the examination, Dullahan was questioned about espionage and whether he had ever worked for another power.

The examiner said he was registering deception and left the room. Dullahan said he was left alone for 90 minutes, still hooked up to all the wires. The examiner returned and said, “Let’s run this again,” Dullahan recalled.

“He tells you the questions he is going to ask,” Dullahan said. “I am going to ask: Did you ever spy for the Irish government? Did you every spy for the Syrians? Did you ever spy for some other country? The last one was the good one. Did you ever spy for the Soviet Union? You know it’s coming and you know it’s the one you have to pass. And your heart starts pounding.”

The examiner said he registered deception again.

The polygraph technique that Dullahan describes here is the so-called “Searching Peak of Tension” (SPOT) test, which is documented in Chapter 11 of the federal polygraph handbook (964 kb PDF) and at pp. 116-17 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (4th ed.) (1 mb PDF). This technique is not routinely used by the FBI in screening situations. That the FBI used it in Dullahan’s case suggests that the FBI’s pitch about wanting Dullahan to work on a “black project” may have been a pretext to lure him into a pre-planned polygraph interrogation. Washington Post reporter Finn continues:

Dullahan was offered and apparently failed a second polygraph on the same set of questions. The DIA also organized its own polygraph, and Dullahan failed a third time, also apparently on the same set of espionage questions.

FBI “re-tests” virtually always produce the same outcome as the original “test,” that is, the subject “fails.” Feedback received by AntiPolygraph.org from numerous FBI applicants over the past decade indicates that “re-tests” are a sham, intended to produce only the appearance of fairness. In Dullahan’s case, a second polygraph was likely offered not to give Dullahan an opportunity to clear his name, but to give the FBI an opportunity to further interrogate him.

Continue reading ‘DOJ Rationalizes Away Polygraph’s Failure to Catch Alleged Anthrax Killer Bruce Ivins’ »]]>

Bruce E. Ivins

On Friday, 19 February 2010, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the conclusion of its investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks. The DOJ maintains that  Dr. Bruce Edwards Ivans, who in 2002 passed a polygraph test regarding the anthrax attacks, was the sole perpetrator.

In an investigative summary (640 kb PDF), the DOJ characterizes Ivins’ passing of the polygraph as part of an effort to “stay ahead of the investigation,” alleging (at p. 84, fn. 51) that he used countermeasures to fool the polygraph:

In some sense, Dr. Ivins’s efforts to stay ahead of the investigation began much earlier. When he took a polygraph in connection with the investigation in 2002, the examiner determined that he passed. However, as the investigation began to hone in on Dr. Ivins and investigators learned that he had been prescribed a number of psychotropic medications at the time of the 2002 polygraph, investigators resubmitted his results to examiners at FBI Headquarters and the Department of Defense Polygraph Institute for a reassessment of the results in light of that new information. Both examiners who independently reassessed the results determined that Dr. Ivins exhibited “classic” signs of the use of countermeasures to pass a polygraph. At the time the polygraph was initially examined in 2002, not all examiners were trained to spot countermeasures, making the first analysis both understandable under the circumstances, and irrelevant to the subsequent conclusion that he used countermeasures.

Although the summary doesn’t state what “classic” signs of countermeasures Ivins allegedly displayed, Michael Isikoff of Newsweek reported in 2008 that the FBI “concluded he’d used ‘countermeasures’ such as controlled breathing to fool the examiners.”

While FBI and DoD polygraphers claim that Ivins showed “classic” signs of countermeasure use, it should be noted that no polygraph operator has ever demonstrated the ability to detect polygraph countermeasures. There are no journal articles or book chapters on how to detect them. And retired FBI scientist and supervisory special agent Dr. Drew Richardson’s challenge to the polygraph community to prove its claimed ability to detect countermeasures has gone without takers for more than eight years.

With regard to the psychotropic medications that Ivins had been prescribed, there are no studies on the effects of such medications on polygraph results.

Also not mentioned in the DOJ summary is the fact that the FBI searched Ivans’s premises for, among other things, “materials on how to defeat a polygraph.” Evidently, no such materials were found, or they would presumably have been mentioned in the summary. It’s worth noting that if Ivins had Googled “how to beat  a polygraph” in 2002, he likely would have found AntiPolygraph.org’s on-line book, The Lie Behind the Lie Detector [1 mb PDF], which explains precisely how to do so.

The question of whether an alleged biological terrorist fooled the polygraph is a crucial one for national security. The polygraph remains the centerpiece of America’s personnel security policy–despite the conclusion of the National Academy of Sciences that it’s junk science.

While polygraphers claim that they can now detect countermeasures, they haven’t offered any evidence to support such a notion. It’s not hard to imagine how FBI and DoD polygraphers–armed with the knowledge that Ivins had become the sole suspect in the Amerithrax case–could review his charts and divine signs of countermeasures in them. In a similar manner, polygraph reviewers claimed that the charts of Aldrich Ames–the CIA turncoat who twice fooled the polygraph while spying for the Russians–showed clear signs of deception. But such signs only became clear once other evidence pointed to Ames’ guilt.

And Ames is but the most notorious of a litany of betrayers who have fooled the lie detector: others include Ignatz Theodor Griebl, Karel Frantisek Koecher, Jiri Pasovsky, Larry Wu-tai Chin, Ana Belen Montes, and Leandro Aragoncillo.

Time and again, the polygraph has failed to protect America’s security. And time and again, these failures have been rationalized away. The polygraph operators say, “trust us.” But the failure of the polygraph to detect Ivins’ alleged deception in the Amerithrax case demands a reckoning. There must be no more rationalizations, no more sweeping the dirt under the rug.

The evidence that polygraphers can detect countermeasures generally, and that Ivins used polygraph countermeasures specifically, must be publicly disclosed so that it may be independently and critically scrutinized.

Update: An interview that Ivins gave to the FBI on 16 January 2008 undermines the notion that psychotropic drugs may have influenced his polygraph results or that he employed polygraph countermeasures. The report of that interview states regarding the 2002 polygraph examination that Ivins passed (at p. 199 of Section 4 of the Ivins’s FBI case file):

Years ago, IVINS submitted to a polygraph as part of the anthrax investigation. Prior to taking the polygraph, he did not research anything about the test, to include ways to defeat its accuracy. Likewise, he did not take any steps to defeat the tests [sic] accuracy or use countermeasures. In fact, IVINS stopped taking his anti-depression/anti-anxiety medication 48-72 hours before the polygraph, and he offered to provide blood and/or urine specimens at the time of the test to prove he was not medicated.

When IVINS was interviewed in March 2005, he was asked to consent to provide handwriting examplars. Shortly thereafter, he researched experts in the field of handwriting comparisons who could possibly be consulted about the technique. IVINS has no explanation why he researched the handwriting analysis but not the polygraph examination.

In addition, comments that Ivins allegedly made regarding his polygraph examination suggest that he really did not understand polygraph procedure. According to the FBI’s report of an interview of someone who knew Ivins conducted on 5 June 2008 (see p. 68 of Section 6), this person related that:

IVINS spoke about the polygraph he took [for the investigation] and that he passed some questions but failed the one about taking stuff from work.

The question about taking stuff from work is a very common probable-lie “control” question, asked for comparison purposes. Polygraphers secretly assume that everyone has taken stuff from work, and the examinee’s denial is assumed to be less than completely truthful. Polygraphers gauge reactions to relevant questions like, “Did you send those anthrax letters?” against reactions to control questions like “Did you ever take anything from work?” If reactions to the relevant question are stronger, the subject fails, and conversely, if reactions to the control question are stronger, the person passes. (For a fuller explanation of polygraph procedure, see Chapter 3 of The Lie Behind the Lie Detector.)

Ivins evidently didn’t understand the function of such control questions, something that anyone who has researched polygraphy would grasp.

Update 2: Note that in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2001, retired FBI polygraph operator Richard W. Keifer averred that ”[b]ased on the results of scientific studies, when conducting a screening polygraph, you will have high confidence (99.99 %) on decisions to clear people.” Regarding polygraph countermeasures, Keifer maintained, “The danger from countermeasures, while real, is overstated.”

Continue reading ‘Former Aide to Colin Powell Accused of Espionage, Fired Based on Polygraph Results’ »]]> A recently filed federal lawsuit documents how a veteran intelligence officer with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) was accused of espionage and summarily fired after failing a series of polygraph “tests” (a procedure roundly rejected by scientists as being without scientific basis). The following is an excerpt from the statement of complaint (160 kb PDF) filed on 7 January 2010 by attorney Mark S. Zaid in behalf of Lieutenant Colonel John Dullahan, United States Army (retired) against the DIA and others:

19. Dullahan retired from the Army in 1992 as a Lieutenant Colonel after more than two decades of distinguished military service, including airborne and Ranger training, with the 82nd Airborne Division, and combat in Vietnam as an artillery forward observer. During his career, Dullahan learned German, French, and Arabic, became both a European and Middle Eastern Foreign Area Officer, and served in various capacities for the U.S. government in Europe and the Middle East.

20. In September 1997, Dullahan returned to DIA as a civilian employee. In the course of his work for DIA, he successfully completed a polygraph examination during which no issues surfaced.

21. In early 2008 two FBI agents asked Dullahan if he would participate in a special program, subject to approval by then-Director of DIA LTG Michael Maples. In or around February 2008, Dullahan willingly participated in an FBI polygraph as a condition of his participation in the special program.

22. During the polygraph examination, the FBI examiner alleged that Dullahan’s participation in Ranger, Airborne training, and combat duty (as well as his enjoyment of hang-gliding) demonstrated “risk-taking” behavior which made him more likely to seek contact with a foreign intelligence service. The polygraph examiner accused Dullahan of meeting “Soviet handlers” when he had visited — twenty years earlier — East Germany in the early 1980s, during his U.N. assignment in Syria, and on his numerous official trips to Europe while on the Joint Staff, including trips with General Powell.

23. The polygraph examiner also alleged Dullahan had adopted the Communist beliefs of his liaison counterparts merely by associating with them. The polygraph examiner’s supervisor likewise accused Dullahan of spying for the Soviets. After the exam was complete, FBI officials informed Dullahan he had “failed” the polygraph and was “in big trouble.” At no time did Dullahan make any unfavorable admissions during the course of the polygraph examination that would justify such conclusions. Upon information and belief, the only “evidence” that allegedly existed to support the FBI’s apparent conclusions was, if anything, the technical results of the polygraph examination.

24. Both Dullahan and his wife, who was then and still remains at the time of filing a senior DIA employee, immediately reported the alleged FBI polygraph results to their respective DIA chains of command. Dullahan further requested that DIA conduct an extensive background investigation to clear his name.

25. Shortly thereafter, two FBI officials, Alexis LNU and Carlos LNU, showed Dullahan an outdated 1985 report that contained adverse accusations about his activities and informed him that they understood his probable anxiety about the incident, had no concerns with his foreign contacts, and that a second polygraph would likely resolve the issue. They opined the alleged FBI polygraph failure was unlikely to present an obstacle to Dullahan’s participation in the special program.

26. In or around February 2008, the FBI administered a second polygraph examination to Dullahan and again claimed that he “failed”. At no time before, during or after the examination did Dullahan make any admissions that could be construed as adverse to his interests.

27. Dullahan then sent separate letters to DIA Director LTG Maples and the FBI protesting what he believed was an unfair process and that the polygraph results were inaccurate. He reiterated his willingness to participate in the special program as the FBI had requested. No written responses were ever received.

28. Shortly thereafter, FBI Special Agents Alexis LNU and Carlos LNU again interviewed Dullahan. During this second meeting, the two Special Agents asked Dullahan why he had not previously reported an unspecified foreign intelligence service “offer.” Apparently, Dullahan had mistakenly typed in one of the letters referenced above the sentence “I went to the home of the Soviet offer [sic].” The word “offer” should have been “officer” and the error was being misinterpreted as if he had gone to a Soviet home and received some form of recruitment “pitch” or “offer”. Special Agents Alexis LNU and Carlos LNU now accused Dullahan of trying to conceal and/or lie about this nonexistent foreign intelligence overture. In fact, Dullahan had received no such pitch or overture but his explanation, however, appeared to fall on deaf ears.

29. On October 1, 2008, Dullahan wrote another letter to the FBI. In it, he once again protested what he believed was an unfair process and that the polygraph results were inaccurate. He again reiterated his willingness to participate in the special program as the FBI had requested. Dullahan requested a personal meeting with the deciding authority and offered to re-take another polygraph examination. No written response was ever received.

30. In November 2008, Dullahan applied for another DIA position on the Joint Intelligence Task Force Combating Terrorism. A DIA counterintelligence official informed him that the two “failed” FBI polygraphs would have to be resolved before Dullahan could receive another position within DIA.

31. On or about December 18, 2008, Scott C. and Cassie LNU, two DIA counterintelligence officers, interviewed Dullahan. They initially appeared satisfied with Dullahan’s explanations and stated that resolving the issue was likely to be a relatively simple matter of administrative action. Furthermore, they also noted that Dullahan was not the first DIA person to experience difficulties with the FBI’s polygraph examinations. They stated that the alleged FBI polygraph failures were unlikely to present a further obstacle to Dullahan’s career and expressed their belief that a DIA polygraph, which was reputedly “fairer,” was likely to clear the matter up. Dullahan willingly agreed to undertake whatever examination DIA deemed necessary to resolve the issue.

32. On February 3, 2009, Dullahan underwent a third polygraph but this time performed by a DIA polygraph examiner. The polygraph examiner informed Dullahan he detected deception. No details were provided to Dullahan to explain the polygraph results, and absolutely no adverse admissions were made by him during the course of the examination.

33. On February 17, 2009, Dullahan was placed on administrative leave and his clearance was suspended without explanation. Upon information and belief, DIA took this action based solely, or at least predominantly, as a result of the technical results of the polygraph examinations.

34. On March 17, 2009, DIA Director LTG Maples personally issued two letters stating that Dullahan’s employment with DIA was terminated and his SCI access was permanently revoked. No substantive or detailed reason was given for Dullahan’s termination or clearance revocation.

It should be noted that both the FBI and DIA have willfully ignored the 2002 finding of the National Academy of Sciences that “[polygraph testing's] accuracy in distinguishing actual or potential security violators from innocent test takers is insufficient to justify reliance on its use in employee security screening in federal agencies.” In fact, both agencies have substantially increased their reliance on polygraphy over the past decade. In 2008, the Associated Press reported that the DIA was implementing a major increase in its polygraph program, despite the polygraph’s failure to catch the DIA’s most notorious double agent and the success of Iraqi fabricators in fooling the DIA’s polygraph operators.

AntiPolygraph.org will follow the case of LTC Dullahan closely and provide updates as further information becomes available.

Continue reading ‘An FBI Veteran Comments on the Pentagon’s Polygraph Push’ »]]> In “Paranoia in the Pentagon,” security consultant and 25-year FBI veteran Jim Dooley lampoons the Defense Intelligence Agency’s decision to greatly expand its polygraph screening program:

The Pentagon, speaking as a single scary voice, says that it needs more polygraph studios. They need them to catch the spies. What spies? The spies it just knows are everywhere, in the Army, in the Navy, in the CIA, and even in the ranks of the presumptive spy catchers, the FBI. Colonel Clousseau suspects no one, but he is no fool; everyone is a suspect.

I would say that The Pentagon is likely to get everything it wants, being the Pentagon, studios, machines, operators, especially operators, with all but the dentist’s chair contracted out. Too bad. In the gigantic incomprehensible incoherent mess of stuff the Pentagon gets, this idea falls flat in the zone of pernicious blunder.

It would be bad enough if it were just another example of security theater, similar to TSA airport screening. ‘That vial of suntan lotion, not that one miss, the one that says SPF 45, it’s too big.’ ‘No it’s not, it says 3 ounces right on it.’ ‘Are you telling me?’ ‘No, I guess I have a flight to catch, where can I throw it away.’

As it is, I don’t imagine that the Pentagon, which after is all there to conduct wars, is the most fun place to work. You never really know, though. I have a friend Lee who told me that the most fun he ever had was the year he spent flying Helicopters in Viet Nam. He showed me pictures of the bullet holes in the canopy of his Cobra to prove it. Whatever, however the work-a-day world once was in the Pentagon, the polygraph is about to make it a lot worse.

My own experience in the FBI with the polygraph was uniformly bad. One of the first substantial cases on which I worked was a kidnapping case. The kidnappers left some confusion as to where they wanted the ransom package dropped and we got it wrong. We dropped the package of money on top of some railroad workers who thought that it was their lucky night. Realizing our mistake we interviewed the workers who denied knowing anything about the money. The polygraph cleared them. Several weeks later, one of them confessed, implicating the other. Each one said that from the start the other one threatened to kill him if he said anything. I still don’t know which one I really believe.

In the early 1980′s I discovered in New York that investigation by polygraph was a la mode in trying to sort out who among the many Russian immigrants were spies. The polygraph kept saying they all were and it was making for a lot of work. Some of us with a more skeptical turn of mind said it couldn’t be. It is hard enough to handle one spy, trying to separate wheat from chaff from money grubbing from score settling from outright lies. The KGB can’t be operating all of these people. Besides, what could a butcher on West 14th Street have that would interest the KGB.

A polygraph expert from Washington came up to explain it all to us. He told us that the polygraph is right 97% of the time and it is really right 99% of the time. He was only claiming 97% to be on the cautious side. The whole exercise depends on the operator. Now if you can figure that one out, you are a lot smarter than I am. I ended up figuring that a Russian coming up from Brighton Beach on the subway to visit our polygraph ‘studio’ was too damn scared to ever ‘pass’ a polygraph, whatever it means to pass a polygraph.

I won’t say though that the polygraph landing on the Pentagon isn’t worrisome. It won’t turn up many spies. Spies know all about beating filters, it’s what they do. But it will produce suspects, the almost clean, whose working lives will be cast up into some goofball MI expert’s in box for disposition.

‘Just tell me the truth. Is that really a 3 ounce vial of suntan lotion, or is just a teeny bit bigger. Then we can all go home, only you won’t be coming back.’

Do you think this won’t result in a little more disorientation down there in the Pentagon? I do.